Publications

The Foundation strives to inform public policy through original research and cutting-edge ideas. We believe good approaches and practices are best forged from a range of perspectives and long-term engagement with complex issues. In this section you will find Metcalf Innovation Fellowship reports and a variety of publications the Foundation has commissioned or produced in partnership with others. Publications are listed chronologically by date published. The search function can be used to locate a report by title or subject.

Toronto’s Great Streets: Redesigning Streets for a Growing City and Better Neighborhoods is a new report by the Ryerson City Building Institute with funding from Metcalf. Lead authors, Claire Nelischer and Cherise Burda, profile five recently redesigned Toronto streets and examine what makes each of them...

Generator and The RISER Project: Sector Developers for Independent Theatre in Toronto highlights two initiatives designed to allow Toronto’s independent theatre to flourish. Commissioned by the Toronto Arts Foundation and published with the support of the Metcalf Foundation and Toronto Arts Council, the research...

Bicyclists and pedestrians account for 59 per cent of all the people killed or seriously injured on Toronto’s streets between 2005 and 2016 according to a new report released by Toronto Centre for Active Transportation (TCAT), with partial funding by the Metcalf Foundation. Learning to be a Bicycle-Friendly Driver:...

More than Money: How social finance can build resilience in the arts sector breaks new ground in exploring how the non-profit arts sector in Canada could harness the power of social finance to strengthen its financial footing. Authors Elizabeth MacKinnon and Christine Pellerin survey national and international...

Canada’s ZEV Policy Handbook is the first comprehensive analysis of the policy options available to various levels of government to encourage the adoption of zero-emission vehicles (ZEVs). Published by Simon Fraser University’s Sustainable Transportation Action Research Team (START) and funded in part by...

The Road to Paris: Navigating the intergovernmental path to our climate commitments argues that Canada’s persistent inability to meet self-imposed greenhouse gas emission reduction targets stems not so much from a lack of will but rather from institutional challenges. Currently, Canada has fourteen separate...

Buildings account for nearly one third of Ontario’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The province’s Climate Change Action Plan earmarks funding to reduce GHG emissions from buildings through retrofits and by making them more energy efficient. This funding is expected to create nearly 33,000 jobs over a five-year...

In the span of just a few years, the term “sharing economy” has become entrenched in the public discourse. What kinds of activities does this term describe? And who is participating in it?
“Sharing economy” or on-demand service economy? presents the first in-depth snapshot of both workers and consumers...

From 2014-2016, Metcalf Innovation Fellow Dr. Sarah Schulman and her team at social design agency InWithForward experimented with new methods to spur behaviour change and shift practice among 400 Canadian social services professionals. They observed that the typical instruments for changing professional practice,...

In late 2016, the Ontario government announced its intention to carry out a basic income pilot project in communities across the province. In response, a range of authors and experts have examined how variations of the model could benefit the one in eight Canadians who live in poverty.
Metcalf Innovation Fellow John...

The population of the Greater Toronto Area is projected to increase by almost 40% over the next two decades. As our population grows, so will the number of cars competing for limited road space. A new approach to urban mobility is needed to address this congestion, one that ensures that all Torontonians have the...

On November 21, the federal government committed to eliminate the use of coal in Canadian power plants by 2030.
According to a new Metcalf-funded report released by the Pembina Institute and a coalition of health and environment organizations, this decision will likely prevent over a thousand premature deaths across...

If the world is to limit global warming to two degrees Celsius, the International Energy Agency suggests that 40 percent of new passenger vehicle sales must be electric by 2040.
However, a frank new assessment released by Simon Fraser University’s Sustainable Transportation Action Research Team (START) and funded...

Are We There Yet? is a progress report on the state of transit investment in the Greater Toronto & Hamilton Area. Prepared by transit advocacy coalition Move The GTHA with support from the Metcalf Foundation, it builds the case for a more unified and aligned approach to transit funding, one that stresses our...

The smart grid modernizes our power system through the use of advanced information and communication technologies. These innovations allow our power grid to produce and consume electricity dynamically in response to shifts in demand and supply.
Ontario has been quick to adopt the smart grid, and many predict this...

For the approximately 600,000 migrants currently working in Canada, changes made to the Temporary Foreign Worker Program in 2014 have left them more vulnerable to exploitation and have further narrowed their access to permanent residence.
These are the findings of Canada’s Choice: Decent Work or Entrenched...

As Ontario’s cities, industries, and farms continue to grow, so do the impacts they have on our environment. Yet these environmental costs are not factored in the prices we see in markets.
Market-based pricing policies — like environmental fees, taxes, or market-based instruments — can provide an incentive for...

As Toronto continues to build and move to a green economy, we must reflect on how this new economy will benefit and be inclusive of all Torontonians.
Racialized communities and other traditionally disadvantaged groups continue to face barriers in accessing decent work in the city. Under-employment, precarious...

Changes in our climate have led to a dramatic increase in the number of extreme rainfalls hitting our cities. When this influx of rainwater hits our gutters, storm sewers, and other impermeable collection systems, it gathers oil and debris along its path—ultimately damaging property, local bodies of water,...

When reviewing infrastructure and resource development projects in Canada, government leaders need to follow decision-making processes that are transparent, democratic, rigorous, and advance sustainability.
For decades, two closely linked procedural policy tools—environmental impact assessment and mechanisms for...

As the changing labour market forces more people into precarious employment and low-income work, the Metcalf Foundation is committed to supporting the individuals, organizations, and ideas that can strengthen our communities’ economic wellbeing.
The Resilient Neighbourhood Economies (RNE) project was a three-year...

Toronto’s neighbourhood of Thorncliffe Park, built in the 1960s, was designed for 12,000 people — young singles and couples with cars to traverse bridges into the city. But by 2008, Thorncliffe Park’s demographic had changed. Its aging apartment buildings had become an “arrival city” for newcomer families...

Working poverty continues to creep upward in Toronto. From 2006 to 2012, working poverty increased from 9.9% to 10.7% of the working-age population in the City of Toronto and from 8.2% to 10.7% in the Toronto Census Metropolitan Area. While Toronto, by most measures, is Canada’s wealthiest city, it now has the...

Social procurement is a process that targets social impact as a desired or required quality in goods or services to be purchased. Increasingly it is commonly practiced by individuals, businesses and governments around the world. While Canada has yet to tap into the full potential of social procurement, there is...

Dollars and Sense: Opportunities to Strengthen Southern Ontario’s Food System has two objectives. First, to better understand the economic and environmental impacts of regional food systems. Second, to assess how increasing regional food production and distribution would affect the larger food system, including...

Among industrialized countries, Canada has the highest proportion of residents with a post-secondary education, yet we also have the highest rate of degree holders working in jobs earning half the median income or less. And a rise in precarious employment and the widening gap between knowledge sector jobs and...

Farmers produce more than twice the food that all seven billion of us need. Our grocery stores are overflowing with thousands of products from around the world. Yet some people are not getting enough food. In fact, almost a billion souls suffer the indignity of hunger in an era of plenty. Some are not getting the...

There are over 338,000 migrant workers in Canada. This number has more than doubled since 2006. As Canada increasingly relies on a work force of transnational migrant workers with temporary status, an industry of third-party for-profit recruiters has emerged to match workers with jobs in Canada.
Profiting from the...

Canada’s disability income expenditures are rising at an unsustainable rate and the largest and fastest growing program is social assistance. Nowhere is this more evident than in Ontario where ODSP expenditures increased 44.8% between 2005 and 2010.
The “Welfareization” of Disability Incomes in Ontario: What are...

The Metcalf Foundation is pleased to announce the publication of our second Innovation Fellowship paper in the arts, Choreographing our Future: Strategies for Supporting Next Generation Arts Practice, by Shannon Litzenberger.
As our cultural expression evolves, there is a need to re-look at some of the fundamental...

Greening the economy at the local level will bring jobs, prosperity, and help us address the environmental challenges we’re facing. That is the finding of Green Economy at Community Scale, by Professors Tim Jackson and Peter Victor — two of the world’s top ecological economists and leading thinkers on issues of...

A healthy and robust local food system is dependant on farmers having access to high quality farmland. Yet across Ontario, development pressures have permanently removed millions of acres of fertile farmland. The traditional handing down of farms within families is on the wane while the cost of farmland for new and...

As civil society organizations emerge as critical solution-generators to some of the most complex problems facing us today, funders must continually ask: how can we best support the unique work of these organizations?
Fair Exchange: Public funding for social impact through the non-profit sector, provides a thoughtful...

The environment for the arts in Canada and our arts funding system have changed dramatically over the past 20 years. It used to be that funding to arts organizations was based on ensuring an institutional structure, in many cases even a building, that would house and support the art for the long term. There were fewer...

The revitalization of Toronto’s Regent Park is one of the largest urban renewal projects in the world. Regent Park: a story of collective impact, tells the story of how a handful of residents initiated a major outreach effort to engage key players from different sectors, resulting in a collective impact of...

Why are there not more internship opportunities in the non-profit sector?
A good internship can change a life, an organization, even a sector. An internship can put someone on the path to acquiring the skills they need to thrive and contribute. Such an opportunity can also make a remarkable difference to the host...

Canada’s reliance on low-wage migrant workers with temporary immigration status is growing but our laws make them vulnerable to abuse. Made in Canada: How the Law Constructs Migrant Workers’ Insecurity shows that low-wage migrant workers are brought into Canada on terms that leave them open to exploitation...

The “Working Poor” in the Toronto Region: Who they are, where they live, and how trends are changing, is the first report to look at working poverty in the Toronto Region. According to the report, the number of working poor in the Toronto Region increased by 42% between 2000 and 2005. Toronto’s working poor live...

Immigrant Self-Employment and Entrepreneurship in the GTA, by Dr. Sarah Wayland, explores whether self-employment and entrepreneurship is a viable option for lifting new Canadians out of poverty in the Greater Toronto Area.
The report describes:
Characteristics of self-employment and entrepreneurship amongst...

This paper is an exploration of the concept of renewal and the role of vocation in sustaining the vitality of nonprofit leaders. It illuminates the crucial role that reflective conversations can play in uncorking creativity and inoculating us from workplace stress. More than 150 leaders in the arts, environment, and...

Working Better: Creating a High-Performing Labour Market in Ontario presents a fresh accounting of the state of Ontario’s labour market and calls for a strategic overhaul. The report takes a look back over the past thirty years, describing a profound alteration in our labour market system. A thorough historical...

Zero Dollar Linda explores the weaknesses in the design of North American social welfare institutions through the stories of two individuals.
It shows what can happen to people when they receive the Ontario Disability Support Program, live in subsidized housing, and try to be as self-reliant as possible. In the end,...

This report sheds light on the challenges facing city parks. It explores how city parks have been held back and calls for more direct community involvement.
“We’ve taken our parks for granted, neglected the need for improvements, and they are languishing,” said author David Harvey. He conducted dozens of...

Menu 2020: Ten Good Food Ideas for Ontario is one of five reports the Foundation released in June of 2010 that together present a new vision for how we think about, produce, and consume food. The reports offer a range of strategies to promote local economic development and improve access to healthy and abundant...

In Every Community a Place for Food: The Role of the Community Food Centre in Building a Local, Sustainable, and Just Food System is one of five reports the Foundation released in June of 2010 that together present a new vision for how we think about, produce, and consume food. The reports offer a range of strategies...

New Farmers and Alternative Markets Within the Supply-Managed System is one of five reports the Foundation released in June of 2010 that together present a new vision for how we think about, produce, and consume food. The reports offer a range of strategies to promote local economic development and improve access to...

Nurturing Fruit and Vegetable Processing in Ontario is one of five reports the Foundation released in June of 2010 that together present a new vision for how we think about, produce, and consume food. The reports offer a range of strategies to promote local economic development and improve access to healthy and...

Scaling Up Urban Agriculture in Toronto: Building the Infrastructure is one of five reports the Foundation released in June of 2010 that together present a new vision for how we think about, produce, and consume food. The reports offer a range of strategies to promote local economic development and improve access to...

Cutting Through the Fog: Why is it so hard to make sense of poverty measures? is about the challenges facing citizens when presented with statistics on poverty. It emphasizes the need to question the implications and assumptions underlying various poverty measures. The authors look at how we measure poverty levels,...

Overly strict welfare eligibility rules are forcing Ontario’s newly unemployed to divest themselves of all their assets, crippling their chances for an economic recovery.
Why Don’t We Want the Poor to Own Anything? by John Stapleton, Metcalf Foundation Fellow and a leading social policy expert, reveals weaknesses...

For the last several years, the Metcalf Foundation has been exploring how best to support nonprofit leaders in their work.
Our various initiatives are grounded in the belief that nonprofits play a critical role in imagining and building an equitable, just, and caring society. Yet, as we all know, opportunities for...

Food Connects Us All aims to contribute to a broader understanding of food system dynamics in Ontario. It is intended as a backdrop for discussions on how the province could move toward a truly local sustainable food system through collaboration and the identification of key leverage points for food system...

In 2001, the Metcalf Foundation launched a new and innovative Performing Arts Program. Five years later, we undertook a review of this program – it was the first time the Foundation had ever embarked on a formal evaluative process. The review was completed between January and June 2006. Grantmakers all make choices...

This report traces the evolution of income-security programs for seniors and children in Canada. It looks at patterns to see what we can learn about reforming income security for working age adults.
Income Security for Working-Age Adults in Canada: Let’s consider the model under our nose builds upon the...

We cannot claim to have people-centred government policies. Not when an 18-year-old, lone-parent refugee is considered to be an adult under four policies, a child under two, a student under a third policy, a dependent adult under two others, a non-resident under two, and a legal resident of Canada under four...